More than a month after his disappearance following a police attack on campesino protesters at Ixhuatlán de Madero, in the eastern Mexican state of Veracruz, Nahua indigenous leader Gabino Flores Cruz has released a video statement saying he has not been detained but has gone into hiding for "reasons of security." Flores Cruz is a director of "Los Dorados de Villa," the organization that led the occupation of contested lands at Ixhuatlán. (Proceso, July 25) Meanwhile, ten campesinos who had been arrested in the police attack were released July 4 following a mobilization on their behalf by the "Other Campaign" activist network. "Los Dorados de Villa" say the Nahuas had been forced from the disputed lands by the hired gunmen of land baron Faisal Nader, despite having a legal title dating to 1938. (La Jornada, July 5)

Representatives of peasant organizations from across the globe have gathered in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas for the "Encuentro with the Peoples of the World," hosted by the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN). Participating groups include Brazil's Movement of the Landless, Thailand's Assembly of the Poor and the international NGO Via Campesina. Meetings are being held in the Zapatista "autonomous municipalities" of Oventic, Morelia and La Garrucha, where Comandanta Delia articulated the conditions that led the Zapatistas to take up arms in 1994: "Our grandparents lived in slavery, without salaries. We asked for land, but we were always denied by the evil government. Persecutions, imprisonments, houses burned. There has never been good justice." (La Jornada, July 25)

A group of ex-guerillas from the now-dissolved Clandestine Revolutionary Worker's Party-Union of the People (PROCUP), re-organized as the above-ground Democratic Popular Left (IDP), led by David Cabañas Barrientos and Italo Ricardo Díaz, charged in a statement that there are "clear indications" that the government of Felipe Calderón seeks to "open a new chapter in the dirty war" that gripped Mexico in the '70s, when hundreds of dissidents were "disappeared." The statement said the "detention-disappearance" of two supposed members of the EPR guerilla organization is a "signal that a hunting season has opened against activists and militants of legal and legitimate organizations with the pretext that they are front organizations."

From the Arizona Star, July 25:

Two ex-Army men receive 4+ years in drug sting
A crack-addicted Army National Guard sergeant who corrupted his underlings and a Tucson Army recruiter who corrupted his soldier brother were sentenced to federal prison terms in Tucson on Tuesday.

From Nancy Pelosi's blog, The Gavel, July 24:

House Votes to Ban Permanent Bases in Iraq

"The Democratic Congress will go on record – every day if necessary – to register a judgment in opposition to the course of action that the President is taking in Iraq. The Democratic Congress will go on record – every day if necessary – to fight for a redeployment of our forces as the central element of a New Direction strategy for Iraq." —Speaker Pelosi, 7/25/07

It's a beautiful time to be alive—if you're a Halliburton shareholder. From Reuters, July 23:

Halliburton Co., the world's second-largest oil services company, said on Monday second-quarter profit from continuing operations rose 19 percent, topping Wall Street views, helped by new international contracts and stronger demand from its customers.

A front-page New York Times story July 24 reveals details of a classified plan calling for achieving "localized security" in Baghdad by the summer of 2008—and "sustainable security" throughout Iraq by the summer of 2009. The document, known as the Joint Campaign Plan, anticipates a decline in US forces as the "surge" runs its course later this year or in early 2008, but it assumes continued US involvement to train and cooperate with Iraq forces. Drawn up by Gen. David H. Petraeus, the senior US commander in Iraq, and Ryan C. Crocker, the US ambassador, the plan has been briefed to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Adm. William J. Fallon, the head of the Central Command. It is expected to be formally issued to officials in Washington this week. "The coalition, in partnership with the government of Iraq, employs integrated political, security, economic and diplomatic means, to help the people of Iraq achieve sustainable security by the summer of 2009," a summary of the campaign plan states.

Afghanistan has announced three days of official mourning for the country's former king, Mohammad Zahir Shah, 92. Announcing his passing, President Hamid Karzai, a relative, hailed Zahir Shah as the "father of the nation." (RFE/RL) An editorial bidding him farewell in Arab News states: "Today, with the country seemingly sliding again into violence, it is not surprising that many Afghans look back on the 40 years that Zahir Shah reigned, from 1933 to 1973 when he was overthrown by his cousin, as a golden age. As well as peace and stability, there was also reform. Zahir Shah was a king who saw himself as an enabler rather than a ruler and who wanted to democratize his country. He did not want or enjoy personal power... Sadly it was his desire to reform that led to his overthrow. His 1964 constitution barring members of the royal family from involvement in politics was bitterly resented by his ambitious cousin Mohammad Daoud, against whom it was in part directed. Daoud's coup opened a Pandora's Box that has proved impossible to close ever since."